He was the son of a weaver, and was himself bound apprentice to a shoemaker.

Feeling a stronger impulse towards spiritual contemplations than towards that mechanical profession, he left his master, and went about the country clothed in a leathern doublet, a dress which he long affected, as well for its singularity as its cheapness.

That he might wean himself from sublunary objects, he broke off all connections with his friends and family, and never dwelt a moment in one place; lest habit should beget new connections, and depress the sublimity of his aerial meditations.

He frequently wandered into the woods, and passed whole days in hollow trees without company, or any other amusement than his Bible.

Having reached that pitch of perfection as to need no other book, he soon advanced to another state of spiritual progress, and began to pay less regard even to that divine composition itself.